Bashar Assad could hardly lose the war with the hefty backing of Russia, Iran, Iraq and Hizballah. Hizballah tilted the fighting against the rebels, while Iraq is feeding his war chest with billions of petrodollars.

Moscow is challenging Israel to make good on its threats to knock out the S-300 or lose credibility. But Israel needs a US guarantee of military backup in case its action spirals into a major conflict with Syria and its allies.

Moscow’s strong military momentum on Bashar Assad’s behalf includes the positioning of Russian troops within easy reach of Syria. But are Russian missiles a match for the Israeli Air Force? Only real combat can provide the answer.

Senior Israeli intelligence sources insisted to debkafile Thursday May 30 that Syria had still not received any Russian S-300 anti-missile batteries – contrary to Syrian President Bashar Assad’s claim that the first batch had arrived. Israel says it will destroy them before they are operational.

A Hizballah rocket fired from Lebanese Marjayoun Monday, May 27 landed harmlessly in Israel’s northernmost town of Metula. debkafile: 48 hours after Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s war speech, his terrorist group joined Syria’s war of attrition against Israel.

The Obama administration has maneuvered itself out of a major role in reaching a political solution to the Syrian conflict. Bashar is building on his battlefield successes to demand a key role in any settlement.

Some Israeli defense strategists still refuse to admit that Bashar Assad, Hassan Nasrallah and Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei are pulling ahead in the Syrian war - contrary to their hopes that defeat would snap their bonds.
This uncertain assessment gives Assad and Nasrallah the gift of the initiative at war.

Binyamin Netanyahu left his meeting with Vladimir Putin Tuesday certain that Moscow had given Assad the go-ahead for his threat to make the Syrian Golan the platform for a war of attrition against Israel with the help of Hizballah armed with advanced weapons and other proxies.

As Obama ponders his options on Syria and is increasingly abandoned by allies, Putin pushes supplies of heavy weapons to the Syrian army, along with high-class intelligence for Assad and his high command and a cooperation deal with Hizballah.

President Barack Obama faced a tough decision Friday, April 26, after warning that Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons would be “game changer.” His failure to take firm action would render the US president’s red lines meaningless. Israel is concerned by the application of this loss of credibility to a nuclear Iran.

Red lines have been flattened by Iran’s rapid progress toward a nuclear weapon and by Bashar Assad’s mockery, backed by Tehran, of US President Barack Obama’s warning that “proof of chemical weapons use would be a game changer.” Two Israeli ex-intelligence chiefs Tuesday, April 23 underlined Israel-US differences.

US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel announced Wednesday, April 17, that 200 troops of the US 1st Armored Division had been sent to Jordan to give the United States the ability to "potentially form a joint task force [with Jordan] for military operations, if ordered" by the President. debkafile’s military sources report that they are ranged on the Jordanian-Syrian border to counter a potential Syrian attack. In a potential war between Syria and Jordan backed by US troops, Israel would almost certainly become involved.

After the Damascus units, the Syrian army has distributed protective suits to units in southern Syria and the Golan, amid evidence that chemical weapons have already been used in the Damascus region. As signs abound of both sides’ readiness for chemical warfare, Israeli troops have started handing out atropine injections and IVs against sarin and VX nerve agents to rebels fighting Syrian troops on the Golan and along the Israel-Syrian border - Israel’s first intervention in the Syrian conflict to date.

Jabhat al-Nusra operated in Syria for years as a clandestine movement, the brainchild of the notorious Jordanian master terrorist Musab Abu-Zarqawi of Iraq who used Syria as his logistical hub. Al-Nusra is now revealed It now emerges as a part of al Qaeda of Iraq - The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.

Islamist fighters enlisted from many countries to fight with the Syrian rebels are beginning to return home. With their combat experience and training, they may serve al Qaeda as ticking bombs in Western cities.

The Syrian army’s 4th Division-Republican Guard cleared most of the rebels out of the eastern suburbs of Damascus Monday, April 8, debkafile reporst. Bashar Assad’s brother Maher at the head of the 4th Division, executed a surprise pincer movement spearheaded by tank and artillery fire, in time to impede the rebel advance on the center of Damascus and the international airport. This major operation is assumed to have been designed by Assad’s foreign advisers, Iranian or Russian, and averted a chemical attack.

The rebel fighters’ newly-acquired antitank guided missiles-ATGM (of both Russian and American manufacture) are knocking over the T-72 tanks of the 4th Republican Guard Division and the 3rd Division, the backbone of the capital’s defenses, while their portable MANPAD air defense systems have brought practically all takeoffs and landings at Damascus International Airport to a standstill.